CHVG: 1974 - Tank you very much

Kee Games wants to tank you... (1974)
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Here we are, 1974... the year I was born!  Certainly it had to be a magnificent year in gaming, yes?  Nope.  No it wasn't.  While there were some new innovations that did push different genre's forward into the arcade scene, nothing "big" occurred in 1974.  Was more of a development year... a time for ideas to matriculate and formulate.

Atari couldn't make 'em fast enough

I read that only about 8,000 Pong Arcade cabinets had been fulfilled by Atari by end of year.  Although this was still quite a bit more than your average pinball table, for comparison the Odyssey console sold almost 100,000 in its first two years.  (Possibly more, but exact sales figures don't seem to exist... and all the "sold" consoles didn't necessary move to consumers right off.  But this clearly shows why the console market was desired, and groundwork was being laid for a home version of pong and possibly other games.

It was near the end of 1974 that Atari President Nolan Bushnell gave the go-ahead for creating a "Home Pong" unit, thinking it could be a great success for Christmas sales in
1975.

During this year, Atari was trying to out-innovate "The Jackals" (as Nolan Bushnell dubbed the competition)… by coming out with a new game every month.  At first they reiterated with a number of different Pong clones, but eventually they also came up with some new creative ideas that were also hits in their own right:

• Gotcha (first maze game)
• Trak 10 (first racing game)
• Tank (yeah! the first tank game).

Kee Games’s Tank is the first game to store graphics data on a ROM chip. It's also a company that was secretly owned by Atari.  The idea of Kee Games was to get around markets where only 1 distributor could operate.  So Nolan setup another company with his neighbor, Joe Keenan, as the CEO. All the Atari games basically had an identical game with a different name -- distributed by Kee Games.  But after Tank became a huge hit, Atari actually went on to merge Kee Games back into the mothership.

Midway’s TV Basketball is the first arcade game to use human figures as avatars, instead of blocks or vehicles.  But the vast majority of games were variants of Pong.  Still, fairly boring times if you ask me.

Play Meter magazine publishes its first issue - the first magazine dedicated to covering the video arcade market.  There's a smattering of issues on the archive.org website, but this would be a treasure trove of interesting information if we could get the entire library available someday!

Play Meter Magazine - One of the earliest issues I found

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COMPUTERS:

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The PLATO system is still one of the few systems that have any games on it that are still preserved - and even playable today on various emulators, or the Cyber-1 platform.

SPASIM (PLATO)
  - Here we have the first documented, first-person mainframe game.  Wireframe graphics... a space shooter... very mathematical and definitely more like a sim than anything else.  It's best to watch a video tutorial, you'll get a feel for it without having to learn the tricky controls.

MAZE WAR  (Xerox - Alto)
  - I've now seen this game listed in both 1973 and 1974... so I'm not sure which one specifically to place it in.  But it was an important early game that introduced some of the concepts which become the first-person shooter.  A level editor was even created, and there was network play for player-vs-player action. 

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CONSOLES:

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  - The Odyssey dropped its price again to $50... but no new games were released.  But that's because this system did not really have programmable cartridges. The "carts" they sold simply had jumpers which would select an internal built-in game.  So by 1974, all the games ever designed were released and purchasable.  Odyssey continued to sell in 1974.. but it wasn't long before the system was dead. 

The game card, which isn't quite a cartridge.

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ARCADES:

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ASTROHOCKEY  - (pong variant)
 - It did have 4 variations of gameplay, including player vs. machine.  That's a nice addition.

ATTACK UFO
  - Uh... its a black & white game with UFO's.  That says a lot. Why are we so violent to tourists from other planets? 

BALL PARK
  - Midway releases in America, this Taito (of Japan) baseball game.  Looks pretty decent.  The sports-focus in video games is  a bit pervasive these days isn't it?

BASKETBALL
  - It's a basketball game from Taito, but no way to see it run unfortunately... but is deemed a "Landmark" title, being the first video game to use sprites, and the first to represent human characters.

Arcade flyers can be way better than the games!

CHALLENGE
 - Another Pong clone... by Micro Games.  Also looks like a "micro cabinet"... the thing is tiny.

"Honey, have you seen the Micro Game?"

COUNTDOWN
 - Pong clone, but you start with 5 points and can't let any goals or you lose a point at a time.  

ELIMINATION / QUADRA-PONG
 - 4-player pong clone... which also debuts in the first ever "cocktail" style arcade cabinet.  That's pretty cool. I did like how Atari was innovating from the beginning with game types as well as cabinet variations. Looking at the playing field, you can see the early groundwork for 4-player paddle games like Warlords later on.

FORMULA K
 - This is the Kee Games release of Gran Trak 10.  Same exact innards as...

GRAN TRAK 10 (GRAN TRAK 20 for 2-player)
 - Atari makes the first racing game... (and of course guys wearing helmets show up to play, with hot girls on their shoulder - see exhibit A)  

Safety First!

Gran Trak 10 was not only another hit game, and a growing genre.. but Atari also incorporated some anti-piracy methods.  Inside was a custom-designed ROM for the game, but Atari gave it the same part# as a Texas Instruments Arithmetic Logic Unit.  This mean that when pirates tried to build their own version, they'd order the wrong part and their clones wouldn't work.  Smart Atari!  Especially after all those frickin' pong clones!

But then, an accounting error in the game's production meant that every Gran Trak 10 machine sold at a loss for Atari.  Dumb Atari! It nearly helped bankrupt the company.  They thought, "Sure. we're losing money on each unit - but we'll make up for it in volume."  (okay, I obviously made up that last part.  Classic joke.)

PIN PONG
 - A black & white pinball simulation game by Atari.  Uhm...  cool... that is if want to take everything that's fun about pinball, remove it, and then sell the sizzle.

PUPPY PONG
 - Cool story behind this... basically a free-play version of Pong, but packaged in a cute yellow dog house. This particular setup had its début at Chuck E. Cheese.  It was a neat attempt at giving kids something fun to play without having to feed it tokens. Only a few survive today, as it never saw a wide release, due to Charles Shultz's complaints about its similarities to Snoopy.  (See Snoopy Pong, 1973).

QWAK!
  - An early light gun game where you shoot ducks out of the sky. And, it sounds like you have your ever-trusty hunting dog to go retrieve the blasted birds.  Aw, those poor ducks - they were so abused by early gamers.  It wasn't until much later when Deer became the big targets for virtual hunters that ducks could breathe a sigh of relief.  

REBOUND
  - Pong you say?  NAY I say! So much different... you see, the ball bounces up & down across the screen instead of side-to-side   Oh my? Gravity is involved!?  Your little paddles (er, psuedo-people) hit the ball over the net and to the other side.  Yeah, I'm a bit sick of all these pong-like games myself, but at least it's a welcome variation.  Was also a very realistic sales flyer:

What even is going on here?

SMATCH
 - WTF? Another great name for some sport game, hah! (I think this was another pong-like game, but was distributed overseas?)

SPEED RACE
  - A Taito release, also known as Racer or Wheels.  This was a ground breaking game, innovating with such concepts as vertical scrolling, sprites with collision detection and a driving wheel for a controller.  One of the first driving games.

Go Speed Racer!

SUPER PONG
 - Even Atari is enamoured with Pong, and puts out this 4th title in the series.  Three paddles per player and better ball physics... increased speed, serve from anywhere - Viola!  Another easy buck from a proven concept, yes?  

TANK
 - Ah yes... the Combat cartridge that first shipped with the Atari 2600 game was based on this original arcade game (albeit with a ton of crazy added variations).  The idea was cool, though.. control a tank and shoot the other guy before they shoot you.  It combined maze games with tank control games... both fun genres IMO.

The original "Tank" was an instant hit. So Kee Games (Atari), quickly devised a plan to launch a whole series of Tank games. They designed a boardset that could be easily modified to change the game. This would allow them to come out with a new Tank game whenever they wanted, with no real extra work needed.  And to think how many variations were included even on the simple Atari 2600 - "Combat" or "Video Olympics" is just staggering progress.

Tank was Kee Games biggest hit

TOUCH ME
 - Okay...  have to mention this game, simply for it's awesome title!  Technically it's not a video game - it's just Atari's version of the vastly more popular Simon.  Atari also released a hand-held Touch Me as well (a year or so later) so you could play with yourself anywhere - "No mom, I'm just playing Touch me!"  Oh, Atari...  trail blazers, yes... but man could they make some bonehead decisions. Oh sorry, poor choice of words.

But the real ironic twist is Ralph Baer (remember the original Odyssey?) sees Touch Me, copies it, and creates Simon. Remember, Nolan Bushnell copied the Odyssey (Ralph's machine) and got in trouble.  But Ralph Baer copies Atari and gets away with it?  That's why I'm NOT a fan of all the Magnavox lawsuits... money-grubbers!  Simon goes on to become so popular that it actually has the impression of being the original, and Touch Me feeling like the clone.  Nice one... you sly devil Ralph!

You wanna play Touch Me?
(is not a good pickup line)

TV BASKETBALL
 - kinda cool... at least they got a BBall hoop on the screen... or at least the flyer says so.

WHAM BAM
 - No seriously, I'm not making this stuff up.  And here I thought, "Wham Bam, Thank You Ma'am!" was a recent saying, but one look at this flyer, and I think you can guess where this game got its name from!  Holy moly...

WILD GUNMAN:
 - WOW!  Now that I see this, I vaguely remember watching somebody at a pizza parlor playing around with this game.  It was so intriguing.  It could've been a clone, but I had totally forgotten about that memory.  This was really a technological stretch. Long long before Dragon's Lair, they were trying to interact with live-motion here.  

I swear I saw this once (or at least something like it)

Wild Gunman was Nintendo's first 16mm film projector games and becomes Nintendo's first big export product, in Europe and USA, because the effects of Japan's oil shortage that occurred in 1973 began showing : Japan's economy went into a tailspin and people couldn't afford using their money on Nintendo's Shooting Ranges anymore.

An updated version of the game was released in the arcades and in the Nintendo NES, ten years later in 1984, replacing photographic images with cartoon-style video game sprites. In this version the player also waited for the opponent's eyes to flash (accompanied by a speech bubble reading 'FIRE!!').  On October 4, 1997, Gunpei Yokoi, the creator of this game was tragically killed in an automobile accident, at the age of 56.

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CULTURE:

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Angering an entire generation of kids...

The Rubik's cube invented

The MRI invented.

CP/M was created by Gary Kildall, founding Digital Research
  - which gave lots of ideas and future fodder for people like Bill Gates, yeah?

Dungeons & Dragons was released!  (and all the future nerds rejoice...)

Pepsi was first American company to sell a consumer product in USSR… 

PLATO games really are leaders… Spacesim, M199H, pedit5, Empire, etc. 

Taito started making games… like "Basketball" and Speed Race (like Monaco GP)

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GAME OF THE YEAR:
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TANK (Kee Games + Atari  = Kataree?)

SAGA #2 - Pirate's Adventure (パイレーツアドベンチャー) - NEC-8801 Walkthrough

I think "Pirate Adventure" should've been more prominent.

YouTube playthrough available as well.  Visit the following link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR6gjaesmQA

After I went through the steep learning curve of playing a Japanese adventure game for the first time, I was at least a little more prepared for the second one.  The translation came much more quickly, as I'm getting better at recognizing the Katakana script the NEC computer's put out.  Going to be an entirely different ballgame if I start to run into Hirogana and Kanji, but we'll leave that for another time.  

For now, I bring you a walkthrough for Scott Adams second Graphic Adventure game - "Pirate's Adventure".  As far as the gameplay, this is one of the more enjoyable in all the Scott Adam's chronology.  Yes, it is one of the easiest, but in a way that is good.  The objectives are clear enough... get to Treasure Island by building a boat, and then recover the treasures there. Some of the challenges is definitely in inventory juggling (you can only carry so much)... but there are a few key puzzles, which have a natural-feeling solution.  The one I didn't like much was trying to figure out the exact wording to solve the "pace 30 and dig" puzzle.  

In any case, here is my Japanese walkthrough, so that you can play this on a PC-8801, or a PC-9801.  The M88 emulator I have lets you type in Romaji, and it converts it nicely to the proper Katakana.  Far easier than trying to locate each symbol on a Japanese keyboard.  For the PC-9801, I created a script I run in the "AutoHotKey" program.  It closely matches the Romaji input approach, so that again... you can basically type in words and it converts to the symbols you need.  (ask me about it if you want to try the PC-9801 version... as I had to use it for that system). 

** SPOILERS **
Do not proceed if you don't want to see the solutions and a lot of screenshots showing the entire Pirate's Adventure game.

WALKTHROUGH

English on the wall - in Japanese market game.

toru taru  - (get barrel)
toru suni-ka-   (get sneakers)
haku suni-ka-  (wear sneakers)
toru kurakka-  - (get crackers) must type the - symbol after ka symbol
ue - (up) - LIBRARY

Nowhere to sit and read?

miru hondana (look bookcase)
      -  furumekashii honga arimasu  (there is an old-fashioned book)
toru hon (get book)
miru hon - (look book)

Usuyogoreta furui hondesu

hairu ana - (enter hole) - INSIDE PASSAGE

Looks a lot bigger from the inside!

higashi (east) - ATTIC

Who puts an attic behind a bookshelf!?

toru taimatsu - (get torch)
toru fukuro - (get bag)
akeru fukuro - (open bag) - matches fall out
otosu fukuro - (drop bag)
toru macchi  - (get matches)
mochimono - (inventory) - shows what you now have

Mochimono seems to translate to "belongings"

nishi  - (west) - PASSAGE
nishi - (west) - LIBRARY
hairu mado - (enter window) - LEDGE

Such a high building in the country...

iu YOHO - (say YOHO) - PIRATE COVE

Beware!  That tide will get ya!

otosu hon - (drop book)
higashi (east) - MEADOW

Text says "Mongoose"...  hmmm

kita (north) - SHACK

Wonder what the pirate wants to drink?

ageru taru - (give barrel) - pirate leaves
miru oumu - (look parrot)

kashikosouna oumudesu

toru oumu - (get parrot)
minami - (south) - MEADOW
nishi - (west)  - PIRATE COVE
otosu oumu - (drop parrot)
otosu kurakka-  (drop crackers)
otosu hon - (drop book)
higashi - (east) - MEADOW
higashi - (east) - BOTTOM of HILL

Strange one hill green, the other brown?

kita - (north) - TOP of HILL

Look!  Treasure Island.  I could just swim there.

hairu sakeme - (enter rift) - BIG CAVE

Oops... lookout for Grues.

taimatsu tsukeru - (torch on)

That's much better.

hairu monooki - (enter storage room) - SHED

It's much brighter from the inside!

toru hanma-   (get hammer)  remember to use the"-" symbol, or it won't work
toru shaberu  - (get shovel)
toru ukibukuro  - (get swimming belt)  some might call it life preserver...
kita (north) - BIG CAVE
otosu shaberu - (drop shovel)  otherwise you can't fit through the small crack
hairu sakeme - (enter rift) - TOP of HILL
kesu taimatsu - (torch off)  - you can see it lit or not if you pull up the inventory again
shita - (down) - BOTTOM OF HILL
nishi - (west) - MEADOW
nishi - (west) - PIRATE COVE
otosu ukibukuro  - (drop swimming belt)
otosu taimatsu - (drop torch)
otosu macchi  - (drop matches)
toru hon - (get book)
iu YOHO - (say YOHO) - WINDOW LEDGE

Death screen.  If you EVER try to walk that ledge without the sneakers...

hairu mado - (enter window) - LIBRARY
shita - (down) - TREASURE ROOM
toru kugi - (get nails)
  - hanmaawo tsukatte yatto nukukotoga dekimashita (I was finally able to pull it out using half-well)
  - nuita kugiwo teni motteimasu  (I have the nail pulled out in my hand)
toru juutan - (get carpet)  - reveals a key

Keys under rugs... as you do.

toru kagi - (get key)
otosu juutan - (drop carpet) - don't need THAT anymore
ue - (up) - LIBRARY
hairu ana - (enter hole) - INSIDE PASSAGE
higashi (east) - ATTIC
toru taru - (get barrel)  it is now an empty barrel
kaizoku o okosu - (wake up pirate)  Don't ask me how HE all the way back here.
nishi - (west) - PASSAGE
nishi - (west) - LIBRARY
hairu mado - (enter window) - LEDGE
iu YOHO - (say YOHO) - PIRATE COVE
otosu hon - (drop book)
otosu kugi - (drop nails)
higashi (east) - MEADOW
kita (north) - SHACK
kagi akeru (unlock) -
akeru hako  (open box) -

What's in the baaahhhhx?

 
miru hako - (look box) - sekkeizuga detekimashita (The blueprint came out)
miru hako - (look box) - chizuga detekimashita  (the map came out)
toru sekkeizu - (get blueprint)
toru chizu - (get map)
miru chizu - (look map)

It's in this cryptic English language.

miru sekkeizu - (look blueprint)

What's all these foreign letters? 

minami - (south) - MEADOW
nishi - (west)  - PIRATE COVE
otosu hanma-   (drop hammer)  remember to use the - or it won't work
otosu sekkeizu - (drop blueprint)
otosu chizu - (drop map)
toru ukibukuro  - (get swimming belt)
hairu  asase - (enter shallows)

The shallows...

kita (north) - OUT AT SEA  (must have the floatation device)

Watch out for the killer fish!

kumu mizu  (draw water) - fill barrel
toru sakana (take fish) -
minami - (south) - SHALLOWS
minami - (south) - PIRATE COVE
otosu ukibukuro - (drop swimming belt)
toru taimatsu - (get torch)
toru macchi  - (get matches)
higashi - (east) - MEADOW
higashi - (east) - BOTTOM of HILL
taimatsu tsukeru - (torch on)
hairu doukutsu - (enter cave) - LOWER CAVE

Cave of twisty passages, all alike.

shita - (down) - CROCODILE POOL

They love hanging out in the dark cave all day?

ageru sakana - (give fish) - crocs leave
kagi akeru (unlock) -
akeru doa - (open door)
otosu kagi - (drop key)
hairu doa - (enter door) - LONG PASSAGE

The main pathway to the storage shed.

higashi - (east) - BIG CAVE
toru shaberu  - (get shovel)
toru ho - (get sail)
toru zaimoku - (get lumber)
nishi (west) - LONG PASSAGE
nishi (west) - CROC POND
ue (up) - CAVE
nishi (west) - BOTTOM OF HILL
kesu taimatsu - (torch off)  - you can see it lit or not in the inventory
nishi (west) - PIRATE COVE
otosu ho - (drop sail)
otosu zaimoku - (drop lumber)
hairu  asase - (enter shallows)  if tide is out only
horu ikari - (dig anchor)
toru ikari - (get anchor)
minami - (south) - PIRATE COVE
otosu ikari - (drop anchor)
otosu taimatsu - (drop torch)
otosu macchi  - (drop matches)

Think I've assembled a fair bit of "stuff"

tsukuru fune - (build boat)

Tada!

toru oumu - (get parrot)
toru kurakka-  - (get crackers)
toru chizu - (get map)
higashi (east) - MEADOW
toru mangu-su - (get mongoose)
nishi (west) - PIRATE COVE
noru fune  - (get on boat) - ON THE SHIP

Hey! I built this ship.

shukkou suru  - (set sail?)

Maybe need a new navigator...

oriru fune - (get off the ship) - COAST OF TREASURE ISLAND

Just waiting for his next "rum fix"

suna horu - (dig sand)  ramushuno haitta taruga detekimashitaga (a barrel of rum came out)
minami - (south) - GRAVEYARD

Is he dead, or just sleeping?

higashi - (east) - FIELD

Think the field is oversized for this small island.

hairu shuudouin - (enter monastery) - MONASTERY

otosu mangu-su - (drop mongoose)  gets swallowed by the snake.  Unfortunately... because this is one of the best jokes in the "text-only" game.  It was a squirrel all along, instead of a mongoose.  When you free the mongoose.. THEN you are informed that it wasn't a mongoose, and you just see "dead squirrel" in the description.  Brilliant fun!

otosu oumu - (drop parrot)  - beast off the snakes
toru kinka - (take gold)
miru kinka - (look gold)

irakiraka kagayaite imasu

toru oumu - (get parrot)
minami - (south) - FIELD
aruku 30po - (walk 30 paces)
horu nohara - (dig field) - find a briefcase?  shaberude horuto torankuga detekimashita
otosu shaberu  - (drop shovel)
toru toranku ( get trunk)  - going to have to bust it open when I get my hammer back...
nishi - (west) - GRAVEYARD
kaizoku o okosu - (wake up pirate)
kita - (north) - COAST
noru fune  - (get on boat) - ON THE SHIP
otosu oumu - (drop parrot)
otosu kurakka-  - (drop crackers)
shukkou suru  - (set sail?)
oriru fune - (leave the ship)
toru hanma-   (get hammer)
toru hon (get book)
iu YOHO - (say YOHO) - WINDOW LEDGE
hairu mado - (enter window) - LIBRARY
shita - (down) - TREASURE ROOM
kowasu toranku - (break trunk) must have hammer
akeru toranku - (open trunk) 
   - suruto nakakara kittega detekimashita  (then a stamp came out from inside)

miru kitte - (look stamp) 

One of most elaborate renders in the game.  Cool.

sukoa - (score)  - 1 treasure, and 50 points
otosu kinka - (drop gold)
sukoa - (score) - 2 treasure, 100 points.  WIN!!

FINAL MESSAGE:

anataha 2tsuno takarawo mitsukemashita  - (you've found two treasures)
tokutenha 100 desu  - (your score is 100)
anataha 2tsuno takaramonowo midotoni takarajimakara mochikameu mashita
    - (you have 2 treasures in the basement from Treasure Island)
korede anatano daiboukenha owarimashita  - (This is the end of your great adventure)
OK

So there you go.  Hope you enjoyed it.  Clearly these are superior graphics to even the Apple II version, which is probably the most familiar.  It's been a lot of fun for me to make my way through these adventures and see the improved graphics.  I've also enjoyed getting familiar with Japanese, although I'm a LONG way from any sense of using the language yet.